by Rob Reger
J.
[Singing, as if to himself, to the tune of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.”] Dottie, Dottie, psychic thief, Sneaking up, your thoughts to keep. Reaching toward you with her toe While you watch the magic show. Ripped your thoughts, now she must pay. It’s too late, she got away.
E.T.
Can it, kid, or I’ll can it for ya!
* * *
Poor Jakey! He tried to warn me—he saw it all in her mind as it happened. What a disaster!!! And NeeChee wasn’t around either, unluckily. His transcripts from this time frame are full of nothing but endless “PRrrrPRrrrPRrrrrrrrr”—he was probably enjoying a snuggle-dream under someone’s trailer.
Am feeling furious and fired up for action. Am going to take Raven with me over to the mayor’s house, sneak in, and confront Dottie. She’s not getting in my mind a third time!!!
Later
Wow…
Some VERY interesting stuff has transpired!
First off—I don’t mind admitting I was feeling QUITE unsettled by the prospect of confronting Dottie. There are very few things a person could do to me that freak me out as much as forceful thought-thievery! So I checked and double-checked Raven’s programming, gave myself a brisk pep talk, and (OK, it’s true) spent a few moments in a pile of black cats gathering my courage before finally leaving the souvenir kiosk.
It was not hard finding the mayor’s mansion. It’s right where it was in 1790, albeit quite remodeled (for the worse, I might add). Somehow the remodel makes it look WAY more Revolutionary Era than it was in the actual Revolutionary Era. Not exactly sure how they achieved that effect, but the addition of bronze statues of Revolutionary Era folk probably has something to do with it. Massive sign proclaiming the tour schedule definitely contributes. Souvenir kiosk selling flags, Uncle Boris Prestidigitation Paraphernalia, and other “historical” novelties is no doubt partly to blame.
Curious: I still have memories of coming to Seasidetown in 1790, but not of the actual device that brought me here. Interesting how she took some thoughts and not others—GAHHHH! Am I ACTUALLY reflecting on the “INTERESTING” aspects of that freak’s monstrous talent???? PHLEBBBHHH!!!!!
>Sigh.<
Anyway. I took a moment to shake my head yet again at the abomination that is modern-day Seasidetown; then Raven and I commenced to sneaking in.
Sneaking in was not hard. The mayor could use some consulting on her security system.
Getting past NannyGuard was also not hard. We found her snoring in a recliner in front of the TV. Tiptoed around her without a problem.
Finding Dottie’s room was equally not hard. There was a trail of typical teenage-style paraphernalia (clothing, makeup, magazines, etc.) leading straight to it. Grakbats, it was kind of embarrassing. I may not be the world’s tidiest teen (correction: I am MOST CERTAINLY one of the world’s UNTIDIEST teens), but one thing you’ll never catch me doing is leaving a trail of my stuff all over the house. Mostly because A) you never know who might find it interesting and make off with it, and B) if no one DOES take it, a feline is bound to claw it, chew it, or regurgitate something foul on it.
But I digress.
We slunk silently upstairs, following the trail of untidiness.
At the top of the stairs we came to a bedroom door plastered with stickers. (Man, I guess Dottie thinks they’ll be living in the mayor’s mansion for a long time!) Raven sloooowly turned the doorknob. And slooooowly opened the door.
How anticlimactic! Dottie was fast asleep in bed. I motioned to Raven, who tiptoed over, then pounced, wrapping Dottie in super-strong golem arms, one hand over her mouth, while I stood a nice safe distance away.
* * *
Me
Listen up, Dottie, Raven here is plenty strong enough to make you regret yelling. So be nice and quiet, and let’s have a little chat, K?
Dottie
[Eyes blinking wildly.]
Me
Uh, Raven, is she trying to nod? Could you relax that iron grip just a tad?
D.
[Nodding.]
Me
OK, Raven, ease up on the mouth a little and we’ll see if Dottie can behave.
D.
HHEE—
[Cry choked off immediately by Raven’s hand.]
Me
Oh, that’s no good at all. Raven, commence Regret Maneuver A.
Raven
[Applying vicious chin-noogie to Dottie’s scalp.]
Me
[Watching Dottie’s face until I felt her regret levels were sufficient.]
OK, Raven, let’s give her another chance. You ready to chat politely, Dottie? Cuz Raven’s also programmed for Regret Maneuvers B through Z.
D.
[Whispering furiously.] What’s WITH this person, I can’t get anything out of her mind!
Me
No, no, you wouldn’t. She doesn’t really HAVE a mind, per se. Just a wee little birdbrain, and some really first-class programming. But let’s talk about you and me, shall we? About how you attacked me—TWICE—and stole my THOUGHTS! SO uncool, man! To start with, how did you find me in the Boardroom?
D.
[Angry silence.]
Me
Go ahead with Regret Maneuver B, Raven.
D.
No! I’ll talk! I was…um…looking for you, actually. I knew it was an important spot and you’d eventually show up there. Attikol’s offering a big reward for you, since the police aren’t making any progress.
Me
What does Attikol want me for?
D.
The plans for your inventions.
Me
Well, you got those.
D.
Yeah, I got them! And what’re you gonna do about it?
Me
[Sighing.]
Cut out your brain and eat it, I guess. Unless you know a better way to get me back my thoughts.
D.
AIE—
[Screech choked off immediately by Raven’s hand.]
Me
Well, Dottie? DO you have a better idea?
D.
My notes are over there on my desk, OK? Just don’t eat my brain!
Me
[Snatching up said notes. Oh the blessed notes! Thank cheeses, they looked long and pretty thorough.]
Oh, give it a rest, I’m not gonna eat your brain. But only because I’m a vegetarian. However, I should warn you that eXtreme vengeance is a particular hobby of mine. And I’m VERY creative. Now, one more question: How is black rock summoned?
D.
Ummm…here…let me get a pen…
* * *
So yeah. I have in my hand…
Wait for it…
Instructions for summoning black rock!
Here they are:
* * *
Be pure of heart and long of limb Full of grace and free from sin Stand under a six days’ moon And trace the ancient summoning rune Then black rock shall be yours soon!
* * *
The amazing thing is: I DEFINITELY recognize this! I wonder if my Dead Dark Aunts have, like, I don’t know, whispered this to me in my sleep? Or embedded it in my subconscious, or something? I’ve tried long and hard to pull up a specific memory of it, and can’t. All I know for sure is that I do recognize it…and that I could have sworn there was something about rainbows in there. AHAhhahhAHAHHhahahahahah! Yeah. Good thing I got a little refresher on the ACTUAL summoning instructions. Rainbows, my cheeks! As if!!
Anyway, I still need to figure out what these instructions mean, and how to follow them. But I am feeling MUCH better about things now that I’ve read this. There is no way Attikol has summoned black rock! He may be longer of limb than I am, but “pure of heart” and “free from sin” really can’t describe a guy whose interests include recreational kneecapping.
Sun is coming up. Am real pooped. Have not fully recovered from tonight’s thought-theft. Gotta get some sleep.
May 17
Those with the greatest awar
eness have the greatest nightmares.
—Mahatma Gandhi
Woke from horrifying nightmares—and not delightfully horrifying, either, but appalling and disturbing. Dreamed that Attikol used my wondrous DuplicatoDevice to make thousands of copies of himself. UGH! Then dreamed that I tried to use Dottie’s notes to make a new Time-Out Machine so I could go back and prevent all that from happening, but didn’t know how to get it working. Am now really banking on Dottie’s notes being very complete. Fingers crossed that my precious inventions are not lost for eternity!
An army of Attikols.
AIIIIIIEEEEE!
Have to leave now to meet Schneider for dinner. More later.
Later-back at the kiosk
VAXTERCLOBBING DRAVVBLOTS…
Dottie has duped me!!!!!!!!!
Here’s how I found out:
* * *
Me
So hey—I learned how to summon black rock!
Schneider
[Glancing around as if expecting to find himself suddenly waist-deep in the stuff.]
That’s great! So…you have it, then?
Me
Well, I just got the instructions. I haven’t actually decoded them yet. But at least I’m not too worried about Attikol beating me to it. I mean, if he figures out what a “six days’ moon" is before I do, I’ll eat my dress!
S.
[Choking on his iced tea.]
A “six days’ moon"? As in “Stand under a six days’ moon / And trace the ancient rainbow rune”?
Me
“The ancient SUMMONING rune"—yeah. Uh, where did you hear that?
S.
On TV, on the interweb, in line for a movie, and at dinner with my twelve-year-old niece.
Me
WHAT IN CRAZELBURG ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?
* * *
It took a while for me to get all the sordid details out of Schneider. Mostly because he was laughing so hard. Will just sum up the important points: For starters, Schneider understands why I don’t watch TV as a general rule. But he made a good point when he said this might, on occasion, make me more vulnerable to duping. Especially if the duper knew perfectly well I don’t watch TV. As it turns out, the rhyme Dottie gave me comes not from the Dark Aunts but from a WILDLY popular show called…oh my frog…Rainbow Zombies. Which features incredibly good-looking teen actors as…yes…rainbow zombies. Posters of whom, I now recall, are plastered all over Dottie’s room. The nerve! Taking a perfectly respectable preternatural creature and making it A) good-looking, and B) RAINBOW-COLORED…………GAHHHH! The original rhyme (“And trace the ancient rainbow rune / Then zombie love shall be yours soon”) was, more than likely, buried in my subconscious during all those semi-brain-dead hours of television I watched in the past few days as I suffered the after-effects of the dastardly thought-ripping. Unfortunately, and ironically, my quasi-familiarity with said rhyme only made me MORE willing to accept it as authentic.
Though I REALLY should have questioned the quality of its poetry. Looking back, it’s hard to believe I actually thought a Dark Aunt could have written it!—A fact that Schneider was far too tactful to point out.
In any case, this has been an important lesson on Dottie’s wiliness. I will not underestimate her in our next encounter!
When Schneider and I had finally settled the point that I still do NOT know how to summon black rock, we moved on to the next piece of business: the large box he’d brought along, which held the library’s complete collection of documents on Attikol’s family. We started sifting through it, piece by piece, looking for anything pertaining to black rock. Nothing so far. It was mostly birth and death certificates, marriage licenses, family portraits, land deeds, that kind of thing. We kept at it for about an hour, and then the dust started making Schneider sneeze, so we agreed to put the research on hold until tomorrow.
Later-back at the kiosk again
OK, so Round One goes to Dottie…I wonder how I’m going to get the real instructions from her? It would be nice if I knew the details of her arrangement with Attikol. Is she supposed to give him the information at a preset time? Or when he asks her for it? Is there some kind of code word? If I knew this stuff, I could try disguising my voice as his and just call her up. Will keep pondering a plan…
Later
Have been reading Dottie’s notes on my inventions. They SEEM very thorough. Based on the Rainbow Zombies debacle, though, I am now questioning whether these notes are accurate OR complete. Sadly, A) I really have no way of knowing how much or how little of what she took is here in the notes, and B) eating her brain isn’t guaranteed to get me back my complete thoughts.
Am feeling the need to know all I can about this Dottie Ebenezer girl. Am going to delve into the TranscriptoFeeds for a while and see what I can learn.
Later
Have just found video of a very upsetting conversation! WHY didn’t I consider the possibility that Dottie could simply rewrite the notes I took from her? Because that is exactly what she’s done.
* * *
Attikol
And there’s the first half of your reward. You’ll see the rest once my engineers have built the devices. Many thanks…you succeeded where an entire police force failed!
Dottie
You better appreciate it. My arm is freakin’ tired after all this writing. Sixty-seven pages, and I had to do them twice!
A.
Why twice?
D.
Oh, uh, my…dog…ate the first set.
A.
Well, there’s still room for more compensation.
D.
What do you want next? Another one of her crazy devices?
A.
No, I want Emily Strange herself! In a cage, that is. We both know her potential for frustrating my plans. The girl must be neutralized!
* * *
Yes. And now Attikol knows I’m in town.
GLABBERGRAKKUS!!!!!
Hmm. So what’s my next step, I wonder? Find the engineers and steal the blueprints from them? Will have to substitute dummy notes, or they’ll just get Dottie to write them out again. (Which would be amusing in and of itself, though not really useful to me.) Should also set up surveillance on said engineers so I can monitor their progress with the dummy notes. Some serious sabotage is probably also called for. Whatever it takes!! Cannot allow them to build my devices!
Am not SUPER concerned about Attikol’s intentions to “neutralize” me…but am glad to know about them. Will proceed with proper caution!
Am running over to the medicine show to check in with Jakey. He should be able to tell me where the engineers are. Will write more later.
Later
Jakey was very relieved to see me. He has been anxious to inform me that the engineers arrived yesterday and set up headquarters in Great-Aunt Lily’s house. Oh, the travesty!!! They had better not change a thing!!!
He also felt very sorry about the thought-theft and kept apologizing for not being able to warn me in time.
* * *
Me
There was nothing you could do. But I do need your help on something else. Can you search Dottie’s mind for her plans with Attikol? I mean, when is she supposed to give him back the instructions for summoning black rock?
Jakey
I’ll have to look next time she’s in range. Sorry, until I know someone pretty well, they have to be kind of near for me to get a reading.
Me
That’s cool. Did you see anything interesting last time she visited the medicine show?
J.
It’s so hard for me to tell what might help you! She doesn’t like Attikol—but you could guess that already.
Me
It’s kind of a given. What about her mother? You said they don’t get along?
J.
Not at all. Mayor Vivi wants Dottie to be, like, president or something…and Dottie just wants to rebel.
Me
K, that’s kind of intriguing.
/> J.
Yeah? There’s all this stuff in Dottie’s mind about the legacy of the Bright Girls, and how she feels like she’s expected to use her special talent for the public good of Seasidetown.
Me
Oh yes—the Bright Girls! So she knows about Sweetie-Pie and her unusual talents?
J.
Yeah. And she doesn’t want to be part of that whole thing. Y’know, politics, civic pride, public service, all that stuff.
Me
What DOES she want?
J.
Um, it seems like she wants money, mostly. So she can go to film school. Can you use that?
Me
Dunno. Gotta think it over. Have you tried getting at the stolen stuff again?
J.
I worked on her as much as I could that night, but the only thoughts I can see in there are her own.
Me
Any ideas why?
J.
Maybe it’s a mental block? Y’know, like that hypnotic barrier you have in your mind, to keep me out of your private stuff.
Me
Wish it worked against Dottie. Yeah, it could be something like that.
J.
Or maybe she’s essentially inanimate, like Raven.
Me
[Snorting.]
Or maybe every time you DO get the thoughts back from her, she steals them again.
J.
Ugh.
Me
What do YOU think it is?
J.
I think it’s just something I haven’t learned how to do very well. I mean, reading two different people’s thoughts in one mind. And in Dottie’s case, it’s gotta be way more than just two people’s thoughts.
Me
I see what you mean.
J.
Or…maybe she just doesn’t have our thoughts anymore.
Me